Law change pushes Duval opportunity scholarship transfers to record

About 1,300 students in the county request moves; 'artificial mandate' creates burden, school COO says.

After a change in state law helped to quadruple the number of Duval County schools required to offer opportunity scholarships, a record number of students are requesting transfers to schools with higher FCAT grades.

About 1,300 elementary, middle and high school students have asked to leave their neighborhood schools. About 1,000 of those students are in high school.

Instead of only schools who earn repeated grades of F having to offer opportunity scholarships, now any school with a D or F and in the lowest two levels of the state's accountability ratings must offer them.

Doug Ayars, the school system's chief operating officer, said the opportunity scholarship program places a burden on the district.

"It's an artificial mandate that disregards boundary lines and the neighborhood school concept," Ayars said.

Last year, the district paid about $1.5 million to transport opportunity scholarship students. This year the district conservatively anticipates the cost to double, Ayars said.

District officials have pointed to the opportunity scholarship program as one of the reasons some of the district's schools struggle to meet state academic standards.

Whether students actually perform better when they use the transfer option is unclear, Ayars said. Historically, the district has seen students return to their neighborhood schools after they transfer.

"I don't know that it adds any value for students, but I absolutely know that it adds cost and confusion to the system," he said.

Wolfson High School has to offer the transfers for the first time this year and is projected to lose about 80 students. The school's principal, David Garner, said his focus is on the students who remain.

"My challenge is to try to make this school the best for the students that are there, regardless of who stays," he said.

Losing the students will impact the school's funding and could result in the loss of five to six teachers, Garner said.

The district is conducting a study of the opportunity scholarship program and anticipates having a rough draft ready in two to three weeks.

This year, the most popular school requested by transferring students was Mandarin High School. About 420 students initially requested transfers to Mandarin, forcing district officials to alter the rules.

"Mandarin just couldn't physically handle that many students," said Sally Hague, executive director of school choice and pupil assignment operations.

High school students attending one of the eight high schools having to offer opportunity scholarships can choose to attend any of 10 high schools that received a grade of C or higher in the district, but the district is only providing transportation to specific schools.

Mandarin was initially the school the district was providing transportation to for students transferring from Forrest and Ed White high schools. But because of the high numbers, Ed White's transportation school was changed to Atlantic Coast High School.

There are still more than 300 students scheduled to transfer to Mandarin. The new students could push Mandarin's enrollment to about 3,000 students, filling it to 120 percent capacity.

It's issues like the one at Mandarin that makes Ayars "not a fan" of the program.

"But I respect a parents' ability to have choice," he said. "I just wish the state would change the process."

so, we can not, or will not, provide transportation for our academic magnet schools, but, we fall all over ourselves to transport our "failing schools" students just about anywhere they want to go?

neither fair or right! i don't have a problem allowing students from failing schools to transfer any school they can get into. that is in fact a great idea, if they have a C or better average. transferring bad students to good schools just ruins good schools. what i dislike is we pay for them, AND REFUSE TO PAY FOR THE ACADEMIC GIFTED! pay for both or pay for neither.

the "troubled schools" should become basic studies only schools. the three "r"'s plus history and english should be the only subjects taught and all extra curricular activities shut down. with a 99.9999% chance of a student NOT becoming a star sports figure, they'll need to know the basic lesson more than how to play a sport. quit wasting children to appease useless parent(s)!